FY 2014 Measures to Promote Manufacturing Technology is a report on measures that the Government of Japan has taken to promote core manufacturing technologies, which was compiled pursuant to Article 8 of the Basic Act on the Promotion of Core Manufacturing Technology (Act No. 2 of 1999).

In line with the report of the previous year, this report was jointly prepared by three ministries, namely, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, and the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, and approved by the Cabinet on June 9, 2015.

Key points of the FY 2014 White Paper on Manufacturing Industries

The first section of Chapter 1, which was written by METI, contains an analysis of challenges that Japan’s manufacturing industry faces as well as that of future visions of this field.

Although business performance has increasingly improved against the backdrop of Abenomics and domestic capital investments have risen, further vitalization of investments will be important.

Manufacturing, which accounts for 20% of Japan’s GDP, creates new innovations and technologies, and has strong ripple effects throughout other industries, will continue to be important. One critical challenge is to develop various human resources and companies that will serve as a foundation for domestic manufacturing, while clarifying which fields are profitable in Japan and overseas, as well as the role of Japan’s domestic production base.Furthermore, while the way manufacturing industries earn profits is changing, there remain significant challenges for Japanese companies in transferring overseas profits back to Japan.

Amid major innovation in manufacturing driven by progress in the Internet of Things (IoT), responses to new business models are becoming a significant challenge for the manufacturing industry. With an eye toward efforts made in other countries, including those in Industry 4.0, the future directions of Japan’s manufacturing industry are examined.